The owner of a Bradford market stall that sold rotting fruit and vegetables has been fined £2,400 following a ten-month-long investigation.
Shikh Abdul Waheed, 63, who owns Fruit World at Oastler Shopping Centre, pleaded guilty to eight charges of offering produce for sale that was not compliant with marketing standards.
Among the products found when Department of the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) officials raided the stall on April 21 this year were rotting cucumbers and plums.
Waheed was sentenced in his absence at Bradford and Keighley Magistrates' Court on 14 May.
According to the Bradford Telegraph & Argus, Elliot Kay, prosecuting, said the stall came to the attention of Defra in October 2013, and since then officers had visited it ten times before the raid, three of which were at the highest 'red' stage of urgency.
When Waheed was interviewed he first blamed his staff, and claimed he was 'never' at the business. However, he later admitted he had an active role in the running of the stall.
Ash Mahmood, mitigating, said his client was not in court because of ill health, something which had also led to standards at the stall slipping.
But the Telegraph & Argus reported that ahead of sentencing, Kay told magistrates: 'Other retailers are aware of these proceedings, and if fines were too lenient than other retailers wouldn't take the deterrent message from this case.'
Magistrates were shown photos of the rotting food, and Alan Wilson, chairman of the bench, said: 'I can say that we were were truly appalled by the state of the produce being offered for sale by these premises.'
Wilson said the amount the bench could fine Waheed was limited by his income, and thus, instead of the maximum of £5,000 per offence, Waheed was fined £300 per offence, a total of £2,400, plus £85 in costs.
